Study Smarter and Harder

The school day is drawing to an end, and the students are busily grabbing their lunchboxes and any remaining items from their cubbies. As the call is given for students to exit, the last thing the teacher is heard to say is this: ‘And don’t forget to study for tomorrow’s test!’

Amidst the bustle of the moment, some of the students hear the reminder while the others rush for the door with whatever happened to be jammed into their backpacks before the signal was given to leave. Perhaps this scene sounds as familiar to you as it does to me. Many an afternoon before a test can a teacher be heard giving reminders to his students to spend time studying—but what does that actually mean?

I encourage you to take a few moments to imagine yourself having a conversation with one of your students sometime before the afternoon rush begins. You are interested in finding out more about their study habits, and you ask the following questions. How do you think the typical student would respond?

• Who taught you how to study?
• How do you decide what to study next?
• Do you ever come back to review the material after the class has ended?
• What study methods do you usually use?
• How do you know your preferred study methods work?

If you are like me, you may have a pretty good idea how a student might answer, but if you are unsure, some research has been done that may help shine a light on the study experiences of the average student (Karpicke et al., 2009; Kornell & Bjork, 2007):

• Only 20% of students used study strategies that had been taught to them by their teacher(s). In other words, 80% of surveyed students were told to study and then left to use trial-and-error to figure out what worked.
• 59% of students decided to study what is coming next or already overdue, and only 11% had a study plan scheduled ahead of time.
• 86% never returned to the learned content again after the test was finished.
• The number one study strategy identified by students was rereading their notes or textbook. 84% of the students used this strategy, and 55% of them indicated that this was their primary studying approach.

While this data is now over a decade old, I doubt the statistics have improved much in the ensuing years. The points above seem to indicate that our students’ attempts at studying without input from their teachers are leading them to something usually called cramming instead – a practice where one reviews material immediately before a test in hopes it will be remembered long enough to answer the questions correctly.

Doing well on an exam after staying up late the night before cramming is a possibility. In fact, favorable outcomes may come often enough to give us the illusion that the method actually works. The reality is that despite achieving a high score from time to time, the crammed information is likely to swiftly vanish from one’s memory long before the next assessment comes around.

But is there anything that we as teachers can do about this problem? How might our students’ learning be transformed if we would take the time to teach our students how to study effectively? I propose that introducing some small changes into our school days could both equip our students with the skills needed to do well on tests and provide them with strategies for independent study that will benefit them for a lifetime.

One thing to keep in mind is that ‘…memories are formed as the residue of thought’ (Willingham, 2009, p. 18). In other words, the more a student thinks about a particular concept or fact, the more likely he or she is to remember it later. We think about many things in a day’s time, but relatively little of it goes with us from one day to the next. It is only those things that we find important enough to continue thinking about that enters into our long-term memory.

Study strategies that tap into the brain’s readiness to remember the things we think about often tend to be the most effective strategies for students to use in studying:

• Low-stakes (or better yet—no-stakes) quizzes are one excellent way of having students practice retrieving information from their long-term memory. The purpose of these quizzes is to strengthen students’ ability to recall the information and not to assign a grade. Continuing to periodically quiz students on skills they have learned throughout the year will solidify the knowledge in their long-term memories for many years to come. These quizzes can take the form of the traditional paper-and-pencil method, but teachers should feel free to be creative in what this can look like. Remember—the purpose is to have students practice retrieving information and not for the teacher to take home more papers to grade. Using mini-whiteboards, response cards (one of my personal favorites), or informal exit tickets are all excellent strategies to consider.
• There may certainly be times when it is best for students to practice the same skill over and over again in their studying, but the time quickly comes when a mixture is better. For example, students required to correctly apply both the area and the perimeter formula of a rectangle correctly in the same study session will likewise strengthen their conceptual understanding of each as they think critically about which to use in the various problems. On the other hand, a student practicing either formula in mass may be able to get by through simply substituting variables without ever needing to think deeply about the concepts.
• Regardless of the method used, the goal is to strategically space the studying out so that the information is not altogether lost from memory but that students do need to work to remember the content. This is the ‘sweet spot’ that optimizes the storage of information in long-term memory. At first, this can seem counterintuitive when we realize that a little practice every day may not be the best. In fact, if students are struggling to retrieve information, it may actually be time to cut back on the frequency of studying to every other day (or less) so that their brains need to exercise a little harder to remember!
• It may go without saying, but study strategies that do not require a student to actively think about or retrieve information tend to be relatively ineffective. You may remember the statistic shared above where 84% of students reread their notes or the textbook to study. Not only is this strategy ineffective at requiring us to retrieve learned information, but students believing they are studying by doing so are likely to feel disillusioned after investing time rereading their notes with little or no effect on their test scores. Just imagine you poured significant time into ‘studying’ and afterwards felt like it was all in vain – would you be likely to do it again any time soon? My theory is that at least some of our students may go through our classes feeling this way.

The statistics shared above show that our students have much to gain from some simple instruction in study skills. Students studying Bible memory, math facts, spelling words, and any required classroom content from kindergarten through twelfth grade and beyond would greatly benefit from applying these simple strategies. How will you incorporate them into your classroom?

References:

Karpicke, J. D., Butler, A. C., & Roediger, H. L. (2009). Metacognitive strategies in student learning: Do students practise retrieval when they study on their own? Memory, 17(4), 471-479.

Kornell, N., & Bjork, R. A. (2007). The promise and perils of self-regulated study. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 14(2), 219-224.

Willingham, W. (2009). Ask the cognitive scientist: What will improve a student’s memory? American Educator, 32(4), 17-44. https://www.aft.org/ae/winter2008-2009/willingham